Essar Steel Limited, which plans to build a nine million tonne per annum (MTPA) integrated steel plant in the state, has started shipping iron ore pellet from its recently commissioned pellet plant at Paradip.
Last week, the six-million tonne a year pellet plant sent 40,000 tonne of iron ore pellet to be used at Essar’s Hazira steel complex, in Gujarat. In May, it had shipped a small quantity of 5,000 tonne pellet, said a shipping agent based at Paradip.
Essar Steel’s Odisha project officials did not answer calls made to them. However, a company source said, the pellet plant is in testing phase and will soon start production in full swing once raw material availability is ensured.
As per the original plan, the pellet plant will use low grade iron ore fines that will be pumped through pipelines as concentrates from Dabuna in north Orissa to Paradip, a distance of 253 km. The company has finished laying pipelines in about 236 km, but had to halt the work for not getting forest land approval for a 5 km stretch. Though Essar Steel later decided to leave the forest area and build the pipeline in non-forest areas, the company is still not able to complete the work as it is yet to get the necessary consent from the district authorities for withdrawal of forest diversion plan.
However, its Paradip pellet plant got completed in March and the company is now getting iron ore for this plant from Kirandul in Chhatishgarh, which also feeds raw material to the company’s 8 million tonne pellet plant at Vishakhapatnam through a separate pipeline.
